


only in paris

by phenomenology



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Cuddling & Snuggling, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Missing Scene, Talking, i have no idea what this is it's not my best but take it, i just want them to TALK GDI
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-08
Updated: 2020-02-08
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:07:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22616875
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/phenomenology/pseuds/phenomenology
Summary: “Beau.”Head turning quickly to look the other way, Beau felt equal parts embarrassed and relieved to see Yasha sitting beside her at the bar, a mug of something in her hands. The Aasimar was watching Beau curiously, concern etched into the creases of her forehead that smeared her war paint just a little. Beau was only sort of ashamed at how much comfort she found in these small details.
Relationships: Beauregard Lionett/Yasha
Comments: 11
Kudos: 187





	only in paris

**Author's Note:**

> [shrugs] just talk you useless lesbians

They left Beau’s childhood home and somehow (it was all a blur of misting rain and a warm hand on her shoulder to Beau) ended up in a tavern in town. Blinking herself back to a more complete sense of awareness halfway through a mug of liquor, Beau glanced around the seedy dive and recognized it vaguely from the times she had snuck in visits during her time living in this godforsaken town. Fingers tightening a little around her mug, Beau glanced around herself for her friends, hating her own mind just a little for becoming so consumed in thoughts of her parents that she had let her guard down so far. What if something happened to them? What if she had gotten separated and didn’t realize it in her haze? What if—

“Beau.”

Head turning quickly to look the other way, Beau felt equal parts embarrassed and relieved to see Yasha sitting beside her at the bar, a mug of something in her hands. The Aasimar was watching Beau curiously, concern etched into the creases of her forehead that smeared her war paint just a little. Beau was only sort of ashamed at how much comfort she found in these small details.

“Are you okay?” Yasha asked, her voice as soft as always and a veritable balm on Beau’s ears after the grating tone of her father. 

“Yeah. Yeah I’m…uh, ha,” Beau breathed out shakily, hating how easily her eyes started watering again, fingers shaking against her mug. She was acutely aware of Yasha shifting just a little closer at the wobble in Beau’s voice, and she felt something in her resolve just completely crumble and break away.

“No,” she said, voice cracking.

This seemed to alarm Yasha because she immediately moved her stool flush to Beau’s and started to reach out as if to touch her shoulder. But Yasha paused before she made contact, hesitation a painful flicker across her features and Beau wanted to start openly crying.

Before Yasha could even find a way to verbalize her request, Beau choked out a tearful, “please,” and Yasha’s arm was immediately around Beau’s shoulders, tugging her closer to Yasha’s shoulder. Beau went willingly, gratefully leaning into the offered comfort. If she hadn’t been so damn drained and pitiful, Beau probably would have played it up, would have teased Yasha a little and maybe flirted some. But right now, she just soaked up the security she could take and let herself cry a little in the safety she found pressed against Yasha’s side.

Managing to somehow collect herself after a few minutes of quiet crying, Beau reached up to wipe messily, harshly at the tear tracks on her face, swiping with the heels of her palms and sniffing hard against the stuffiness in her nose. She didn’t want to pull away from Yasha, but Beau felt pathetic enough as it was, and Yasha was just awkward enough to let Beau go without much of a fight. 

“Sorry,” Beau muttered, reaching for her mug and taking a large gulp, wincing at the burn the whiskey left trailing down her throat. 

“What for?” Yasha asked quietly, mismatched eyes trained carefully on Beau’s face. 

“Just,” Beau gestured vaguely at her tear-stained face and sighed long-suffering. “All this. I’m not usually this uh… _weak_.”

The disdain in her own voice surprised Beau, but she meant what she said. Beau was usually stronger than this, didn’t usually let her emotions get this out of control, didn’t let herself be such a mess.

“For being a person?” Yasha said quietly, and Beau startled out of her spiral of thoughts, looking quickly to Yasha.

“What?”

“You’re apologizing for having emotions.” It wasn’t a question, and Yasha no longer looked confused, just a little sad and a lot understanding. Beau was viscerally startled, and she must have shown it because Yasha shifted her gaze just slightly off of Beau’s and kept speaking.

“You don’t have to apologize for anything that happened tonight, Beau. You told us enough for us to know that you and your family weren’t on good terms going into all of this. None of us – or at least I didn’t – expected you to be entirely stoic through that whole encounter. If there’s one thing we all understand, it’s that family is complicated.”

Beau felt like crying all over again, eyes wide and watering quite without her permission as Yasha looked at her directly once more, still as quiet and soft as always.

“You’re allowed to cry and hurt around us, Beau. You don’t have to pretend anymore.”

She said it so simply, so easily, like being vulnerable and honest was something Beau could just _do_ because why wouldn’t she do that around these people? These people who were more family than those inside the house she had just left. Yasha said it like Beau hadn’t spent the first several months of their time together lying about almost everything about her on instinct. It wasn’t that she was incapable of telling the truth, it was just second nature to twist the details in her favor, because the truth was never beneficial to her until very recently, and even then it was tenuous.

“I don’t know how,” Beau managed, looking up at Yasha with an expression of mild fear borne from a feeling of being so lost and confused, she didn’t know what else to do. 

Yasha’s lips quirked up at the corner just slightly and she leaned a little closer, like she was going to share a secret.

“Me neither,” she whispered, eyes boring into Beau’s. 

It was such a startling and sudden thing that it pulled a quick, sharp laugh out of Beau, her eyes watering and her chest aching, but amused despite herself. This seemed to be a reaction that Yasha approved of, however, because the Aasimar’s smile curled just a little wider and she leaned back a little, looking distinctly pleased with herself.

“Sometimes, situations force us to be more honest than we want,” Yasha continued, looking calmer now as she regarded Beau. “It’s not always…easy, or comfortable. But it shows us who is willing to stand by us. You all did the same for me, even though I didn’t think I deserved it.”

Beau was quick to open her mouth and defend Yasha with a firm, “you absolutely deserved it. I promised that we would protect you.”

Yasha didn’t say anything in response, but the look in her mismatched eyes was like a blow to Beau’s gut. She realized quickly with dizzying confusion that the promise she had made Yasha weeks ago was being given back in kind. She hadn’t even had to ask for it, her found family was just doing so because…

Because they cared?

She must have looked as lost and confused as she felt, because Yasha pushed their mugs towards the bartender and stood. Dropping a steady hand on Beau’s shoulder, Yasha gestured to the back where Beau knew there were absolutely shitty excuses for rooms.

“The others have already gone to bed, Jester’s claimed our room. Let’s get some sleep.”

Allowing herself to be tugged to her feet, Beau numbly followed Yasha to the rooms that smelled like absolute shit. Jester was indeed there already, having forgone the bed in favor of curling up in a corner, propped up against the wall and looking distinctly uncomfortable, but asleep. 

Yasha took one look at the strange, haphazard beds, and promptly began pulling her bedroll from her pack and setting it up on the floor. Beau almost took the bed, but Yasha pinned her with a look that made Beau’s already frail resolve crumble to pieces. Tugging her own bedroll free, Beau tossed it down beside Yasha’s and tried to get comfortable despite the smell of the room lingering around them.

Once they were both settled, Beau peered through the darkness at the very faint outline of Yasha’s features that she could make out. The Aasimar was watching her, mismatched eyes just shy of glowing in the dim and flickering over Beau’s features as if she were studying the monk. Feeling her cheeks flush just a little, Beau reached out, fumbling slightly in the dark, and managed to curl her fingers around Yasha’s wrist, giving it a little squeeze. Yasha didn’t move, merely kept staring back at Beau, calmly, quietly.

“Thank you…Yasha,” Beau managed to say to the space between them. The words felt heavy as they rolled off her tongue, meaning so much with so little. She wished that she had the words to say exactly what she meant, but for once, Beau couldn’t find the words she wanted to say. Maybe it was the exhaustion weighing heavy from being emotionally drained, or maybe it was the alcohol Beau had managed to drink. But she couldn’t say more than that.

Despite it all, Yasha seemed to understand, smiling faintly through the darkness and flipping her hand around so she could grab onto Beau’s and return the gentle squeeze. They stayed like that for a few minutes, peering through the darkness at one another, hands clasped, and Beau knew that she was understood, regardless of how many words of gratitude she spoke or not.

They fell asleep like that a while later, hands intertwined and a new understanding grown between their quiet.


End file.
